Helpful ReplyLockedVirus

Virus

Night before last I received notification that Cakewalk was up and running. I was pleased as I had purchased Sonar Home Studio not very long ago (also purchased other CW products over the years). I clicked on the link "get early release download". A thing popped up warning me and asking if I trusted the site. I thought I'd just save the file to my desktop and not open or run it. The PC that I record on is not connected to the internet, I didn't go so far as transferring to that PC luckily. Yesterday after work I started up the laptop and everything was wiped clean. Programs are empty, documents are empty. all files are gone. Last night I tried system restore from safe mode. Still all files and programs are gone. Just before bed I searched another pc (a tablet) and there was endless warnings and acknowledgment of the virus. All or this has disappeared today other than the Overload waning. Not only did it wipe out my HP W7 laptop, it erased the portable Passport hard drive that I just purchased 2 weeks ago. I've spent hours formatting songs in pdf files to on this laptop to transfer to my tablet for use with an Airturn pedal. All of these files are gone, all user programs are gone (empty links).

It is extremely unlikely downloading BandLab Assistant is the cause of your problem. If you have any concerns, support is the best place to have this discussion. FWIW, I was monitoring the forum most of last night and did not see any posts about a virus and just checked deleted posts and see no posts regarding a virus were removed. The Overloud issue was covered in your previous thread. BTW, today you created several threads identical to the previous thread. I removed the duplicates and ultimately locked the previous thread.

As an aside, in order to install and activate Cakewalk by BandLab, the PC must be connected to the internet. Copying BandLab Assistance or the actual Cakewalk by BandLab installers will not get the product installed and activated.

There is nothing in your post to indicate a connection with your problems and CbB.I take my Internet security and privacy seriously, and had no problems what so ever during or after install a few days ago. I use a top of the line quality 24/7 updated service, and had no warnings during the install ... or after doing an hour long deep scan of all files on my computer. I'm fairly certain that the source of your problems lie elsewhere.

I hope you are aware that you can catch a virus just by visiting the wrong web page without adequate protection.

I am in a similar boat as Warped53 after doing the early release install. I did a restart of my computer a couple of days later and my computer started doing disc checks / repairs on multiple disc drives before loading Windows. Files started missing from all over the place and now I can't even get Windows 10 to come up. Checked RAM and it is in good shape. After all the craziness - I remembered the bandlab / sonar early install. I am pretty sure this is the source of my pain!

If anyone else downloaded BandLab Assistant / Cakewalk and now has a virus and / or disappearing files issue with their computer - please post info here. If you find other forums / threads with similar concerns - please post links.

update^^^I am very sorry to have blamed Cakewalk/Bandlab for what happened.I have been a Cakewalk user for 20 years from back when you bought it in a box from the music store. About a year or two ago I bought Sonar Home Studio. When I heard that Henry over at Gibson had dropped Cakewalk out of spite I abandoned it and tried to get a handle on Reaper. Reaper's support is awesome but I just couldn't find my way with it. I received an email from Harmony Central announcing that Cakewalk was back in action, which thrilled me to pieces. From their link it took me to an "early release" download button. I went ahead, however there was a warning thing that came up and it asked me if I trusted the site, I said yes. I specified that I wanted it only saved to my desktop which did not happen. Pages started flipping and the screen flashed a couple times and that was it. The next evening I turned the laptop on again and it looked like a fresh install of windows had taken place. No files, favorites, programs that I had installed. It never occurred to me that the Cakewalk download could be the culprit. I tried restoring from Safe Mode but even though it said the restore was successful everything was still gone. I was frustrated by gave up for the night. After, while lying in bed I thought maybe I should check to see if the Cakewalk download could possibly be behind it so I popped open my Android tablet. I did a Google search for "Cakewalk virus" which pointed to a thread (or threads) on this forum that were posted only hours before my search. When I saw "Overloud Virus Warning" I thought it meant something like "loud caution" (hey it was from Singapore, I figured it was just a way of speech). There was a few entries on Google that all lead me to the same warning posted shortly before my search. Since I got to those threads from the Google search I wasn't able to navigate back within the forum so I thought the Cakewalk site was down because of this. The next morning before work I thought I'd search again, only this time I went directly to the Cakewalk Forum and I could find nothing regarding a virus so I (wrongly, sorry to say) assumed that it had somehow been covered over. Remember, the first time I arrived by Google to specific threads I am very sorry about all of this and regret how I reacted. I have managed to restore my laptop by going a little further back with my restore point, so all is good with me, again I apologize profusely and am very sorry to have stirred up any commotion. I still do not know what happened but if no one else is having a problem then obviously Cakewalk was not to blame. Could it be the link from Harmony Central, I don't know. Or something totally different, like Microsoft? Who knows? I was stupid to start more than one thread about this on your forum where I was called a troll etc. which was total appropriate. Besides being sorry I am very embarrassed. So having stated my piece you guys can be done with me and I'll just fade off into the sunset, maybe try to get Reaper to work for me.p.S. - I did have look around at some of the song posts on Bandlab (which I don't really understand) and listened to some of the songs contributed and was really impressed with the music and the commentary. It seems like a good thing you guys have going here. Bye.

Timing wise... Is possible that you managed to get a fixed version of the file? Or an uninfected version from a different server?

For the sake of others - I hope it wasn't the "early release download" of BandLab Assistant / Cakewalk install that caused my issues. But at the moment - it sure seems like it to me.

Thanks for your feedback.

BBC

It was the early release download that I scanned.

Always be cautious with links to web downloads. Make sure that you are only downloading from the official site. There are malicious 'typo-squatters' that register fake web domains with names that are close, and provide spoofed graphics that are nearly exact copies of the originals.

These bad actors can hide malicious payloads there, just waiting for victims ... which is a common tactic with banking trojans, but the same methods could be used anywhere. Not sure what the financial gain would be for someone to hack the BandLab download, though. Most bad guys these days are in it for the money...

I have still not been able to find the source for my computer issues. But apparently I am the only person that downloaded BandLab / Cakewalk and started having major problems (files disappearing from multiple drives). With that in mind - I guess I can rule out a BandLab / Cakewalk as the source of my pain. At this point - I can say it was just a coincidence. And that is a good thing for the folks that downloaded it and are using it.

When I first tried to download and run the Bandlab download tool both Norton antivirus and Windows 10 barffed. I bypassed this and all went well. I noticed on some of the YouTube videos on the download they had the same issue. Basically it said there have not been many downloads of the file so it might be suss. I have done a number of tests since and have no reason to believe it is in fact a virus or contains a virus.

I have seen in the past, malicious download links on various software sites that claim to be for downloading music software - my son had a knack for finding those the hard way.

The lessen for him, and my advice to anyone, is to ONLY go to official sites for downloads, particularly for music software. Even when I receive emails with download links in them, I MUCH prefer to use my bookmarked URL, or will type in the URL myself. I have seen MANY emails claiming to be from one company, only to discover on closer inspection that the 'display name' of the sender is NOT the actual company or entity it initially looked like.